Demise Of Tiki-Taka Or The Rise Of Dogma?

Following Real Madrid’s counter-attacking masterclass that destroyed Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena, Nuraen Adeshina offers his thoughts on Guardiola's brand of football

Well, lesson learnt then. Bayern lost the game to a simple albeit perplexing inability to do the basics; defensive organisation at set pieces. When the post mortem begins though, scrutiny will extend to the 180 minutes of football between both teams.

That’s when systems and tactics would be considered in some details. The default conclusion will put Bayern’s undoing down to their passing, passing and more passing game plan. In other words, Tiki-Taka will be lampooned as an unworkable system at the highest level. With some merit too, everyone will recall how this same Bayern team, combining power with finesse, steamrolled Barcelona, the original owners, over two legs last summer.

Bayern Munich boss, Pep Guardiola                       PHOTO: fcbayern.de

The enemy though isn’t really the system but a dogmatic adherence to systems. Pep Guardiola and the other so-called purists must understand what a manager’s role is: set up a team in a way that gives said team the maximum opportunity to play to its strength while simultaneously minimising the opposition’s strength.

In other words, systems must remain secondary in the overall scheme of things. This argument while well worn needs revisiting, football managers need to be reminded they are no different from Managers in other spheres of human endeavours, Subject Matter Expert, armed with nous and charged with delivering objectives.

This point cannot be over emphasized seeing as Pep has managed to spawn a huge, growing number of fundamentalists who hold almost to the point of dogma, that there is indeed only one way to play. How might Google for example contend with a manager who obdurately posit that the only way to beat Facebook in the race for social networks is not to own one?

Bayern’s chastening immediately reminds of Liverpool’s Brendan Rogers, who got frustrated by been out-thought by his erstwhile mentor, proceeded to proclaim the winning system immoral, almost illegal even.  And he is not alone. Liverpool legend, John Barnes had gone on record a week prior to proclaim Jose Mourinho’s use of three pure forwards late in the game against PSG as “not tactics but substitutions”. Yet it is not difficult to argue that a system switch can easily be regarded as a tactical decision.

Indeed, dogmatists miss the whole essence of systems and tactics – a clear cut approach of fulfilling objectives, with objectives remaining the end.

It is important at this point to take a look back at the contemporary evolution of tiki-taka with Spain as obvious example. One of Vicente de Bosque’s major tactical tweak, post 2008 European Championship, was to engender a slower, more patient system  that emphasized  passing sequences in and around their own half of the field essentially to deny opponents the ball, having realised his team’s (relative) inherent weakness laid at the back(regardless of who played there).

Obviously, Guardiola helped to develop this system, originally, taking the passing sequence to the opponents final third in the hope that away from his team’s goal, the opposition is less portent.Consequently, teams with fast transition simply allow them huff and puff in their exchanges, only to pick them apart with lightening counter attacks requiring three, at most four passes, to put deadly forwards clean through on goal.

At the heart of this steadfastness is an arrogance that borders almost on insanity. Football isn’t going to change; victory will forever be determined by goals scored versus conceded. Bearing this in mind, the best managers will develop systems that place the overriding focus on goals while simultaneously incorporating a distinct identity. That means a willingness to adjust playing systems (sometimes dramatically) to maximize strength and minimise weaknesses. In short, objectives and not identity is what must be cast in stone.